


Speak of the Devil

by lady__sansa_stark



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Also content warnings for:, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cutting / self-harm, F/M, It kind of got away from the teacher/student in part 2 tbh, Sleazy pete being sleazy, Suicide / suicidal thoughts, Teacher/Student, child kidnapping, mention of implied rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-22
Updated: 2016-11-28
Packaged: 2018-09-01 12:15:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8624137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady__sansa_stark/pseuds/lady__sansa_stark
Summary: In the middle of unraveling the suicide of an eight-year-old boy, Petyr Baelish stumbles across a girl just as broken as he is.





	1. speak of the devil -

**Author's Note:**

> [Good lord I'm bad with summaries. I admit I'm not sure how the plot and themes came to be - the story wrote itself one night. All I had working with was 'teacher/student relationship', and then this happened.  
> I do hope you enjoy this story! Let me know what you think :) ]

 

            Teaching was the sort of profession adults went into because of some inherent _love_ of it. Of educating the next generation; of watching children grow. It was an innate sort of desire of wanting to watch the young learn and succeed, to help them discover their dreams and achieve them with the same fervor the teacher had in teaching.

            Petyr Baelish _hated_ children. Not with a passionate fire, not with a burning need to attack them and their _foolish_ dreams and _whimsical_ ideas. Petyr was a child at some point, after all. Petyr had his own foolish dreams and whimsical ideas a long, long, _long_ time ago.

            Rather, Petyr hated that he was stuck _here_ teaching basic math to a group of children. He much preferred dealing with the youth of high school or college – their dreams were, by-and-large, already shattered by the real world. The whimsy fantasies were nothing by embarrassing memories of their childhood. Kids of those ages were starting to learn their place in the cruel, terrible world of Reality.

            Unfortunately, the current _assignment_ stationed Petyr here. A private school, grades kindergarten through eighth. Not only were these children filled with their idiotic dreams and friendships, but they were the offspring of King’s Landing’s elites. From the stuffy merchants to the stuffier governors.

            The children were just like their parents: in summary, a _nuisance_.

            And so Petyr stood, detailing how to find slopes and derive equations of lines. The children of this grade seven class stared at him with wide, vacant stares. Some scribbled down notes, some passed notes between each other. They were just as pleased to be sitting there learning as Petyr was in teaching them.

            At least the feeling was mutual.

            Of course, Petyr’s class was just before lunch. The children’s already limited attention was being drawn away from the scratch of his chalk on the board and towards the clock, ticking down their sentence in this hellish room.

            One of the kids, a short stuffy boy with blond hair and greasy skin, threw a pencil at another. Then another. Laughter and shouts erupted.

            _Good gods, there’s five minutes left_ , Petyr thought, turning to stare at the children. The chalk in his fingers was threatening to crack. _Couldn’t they wait to annoy each other after the bell?_

            “Afterschool detention to both of you,” Petyr announced. The sniggers in the class faded. But that boy – oh, what Petyr would have given to have _that boy_ be the one murdered rather than his brother. For a child who lost a sibling, Joffrey was rather carefree and uncaring.

            Or perhaps this was a result of his loss? Taking out his sadness and untampered emotions on the other children in his class? Not likely.

            The chalk snapped. Petyr couldn’t care less about the _emotions_. He wasn’t a psychiatrist or a counselor. No money in the all of Westeros could convince Petyr to care a fraction for these children’s emotions. All he had to do was figure out who had sent the death threats, and he would be out of there. The sooner, the better.

            He set the broken chalk on the board’s lip, wiping his hands to clear the dust. Another reason to hate being here – the chalk, the dust, the coarseness it seared into Petyr’s skin. For the amount of money extorted from these children’s parents, one would think the school would be able to afford whiteboards instead.

            “Your test will be Friday. Everything that I’ve covered up to today’s lecture will be on it.” A ripple of groaning mixed with the flurry of chairs being scooted. Of papers and books and pencils being put away.

            There were still a few minutes before class was officially over, but Petyr needed those precious seconds as much as the students. To clear his mind, to ease the frustration of teaching and the current stagnation of his case. No one in administration harassed him about letting his classes out early, anyways. They must have thought he’d be done with the case already.

            He should have been.

            A suicide in an uptown private school. The first case of suicide since the school’s inception decades ago. Almost a week since the suicide, since Petyr was assigned to _take care of it_ \- and nothing. His mind was growing restless from the lack of leads. If anything, the prospect of having to grade exams was enough incentive to get Petyr to hurry the hell up.

            A _crash_. Laughter. Muffled sobs. More sniggers and snears.

            Petyr glanced up, lecture notes in his hands.

            Joffrey had pushed a student from her chair. Terrible, snarling curses erupted from his lips, his skin flushed and oily in the fluorescent lighting.

            Other students were laughing along. The rest were staring between Joffrey and Petyr, wondering in fear what their uncaring, mean-spirited teacher would set as punishment.

            Petyr gritted his teeth, the papers in his fingers crunched.

            Oh, if he could give that little shit detention for the rest of the schoolyear. Not in Petyr’s room – _he_ didn’t want to deal with Joffrey more than he had to. Preferably a janitor’s closet, dark and cramped and locked. Petyr _accidentally_ forgetting to set the boy free.

            But he couldn’t. The boy was in _trauma_ , the school and family said. Over and over: he’s in trauma; he’s in shock; it’s not his fault if he lashes out.

            His family – those detestable and dim-witted Lannisters – hired Petyr to discover who had been sending their younger son death threats. Surreptitious notes and whispered words that led to the poor, little Lion to embrace asphalt with terminal velocity. They said the sight of all that _blood_ and _brain_ splattered was enough to sicken anyone. Petyr had to admit the gruesomeness of it when he visited. What was left of Tommen, however, was hardly the worst death Petyr had the misfortune of dealing with.

            Part of Petyr wondered if he took the case more because of the _resemblance_ between himself and the dead student. Either that, or because of the hefty sum the Lannisters were always willing to pay to clean up their messes. _And what a disgusting mess they’ve wrought_.

            The ringing bell broke him from his thoughts.

            The children were still standing, staring, waiting. Joffrey had the hideous look of someone who knew he was untouchable.

            Petyr folded his notes and set them aside, casually walking over towards the back of the room. “By Friday,” he began, staring down at the blond child. “I expect a hundred lines of _I will not disrupt my classes or cause harm to other children_. Signed by your parents.”

            The boy narrowed his eyes. “I’m in _distress_ ,” he emphasized. None of the other teachers would _touch_ the snobbish Lion for fear of reprimanding by his family. A family that was slowly, carefully gaining more and more power and influence in the government. How _convenient_ were the deaths or urgent business of other families that sent them away from King’s Landing.

            “Too much in distress to not remember how to write, Mr Baratheon?”

            Joffrey’s flush reached the tips of his ears. Other children behind him were stifling sniggers – any sound from them, and their lunch would be spent in the nurse’s office. They were just as impatient in seeing Joffrey get what was coming to him.

            The boy was biting his tongue, chewing on words. Debating whether or not he could get away with cursing down a teacher.

            He thought better of it and stormed out without another word. The door slammed against the hall.

            With the tension eased, the rest of the students filed out.

            Except for one.

            Petyr was turning back towards his desk when he saw her. He had honestly _forgotten_ the child, so riled up against a boy of thirteen name-days. Such a young thing he was. _And already a pain in the ass_. Petyr could not imagine how terribly the country would be ruled once the boy reached of age. Assuming the Lannister’s hold on their power lasted that long.

            She was staring at Petyr, eyes wide in shock and fear and pain. A delicate hand was rubbing at the back of her head. The chair she once sat upon lay overturned beside her. Her legs were lithe and smooth and bent apart – perhaps she had forgotten her _modesty_ during the debacle with Joffrey.

            Petyr couldn’t stop staring at the cascading waves of fire framing perfect ivory skin. The same heat of her hair was found on her lips, in her cheeks. And cooling the flame were eyes of the clearest blue sea. So wide and open and deep – Petyr imagined swimming in them. _Remembered_ once wanting to swim and drown himself in the same beauty.

            Petyr was a child again. Small with thin limbs and an awkward face. Such a long time ago. But now he stood above the girl with fire coursing from her. Now he stood watching the girl stare back in _fear_.

            He offered her his hand. “Are you alright, Ms Stark?” Ah, but _this_ girl of fire was drowned by the harsh world of snow and mountains, not the rivers and valleys of years past.

            This girl was the same. The shade of hair, the curve of her cheek. And yet, a girl entirely of her own making. A girl entirely of Petyr’s own _destruction_.

            She lightly gripped Petyr’s proffered hand, raising herself up. The numerous bracelets she wore jangled, the only sound. Her fingers were small and smooth and delicate. And warm.

            “Th-thank you, Mr Baelish,” she sputtered. Hands moved to smooth the pleated skirt, moved to set errant curls back in place. She moved to collect her things, strewn across the floor in her sudden _removal_ from her chair. She righted that, too, setting everything in its proper place before leaving.

            She let the door close behind her without a another glance back.

            Had she looked, she would have noticed Petyr’s gaze never once falling from her.

* * *

            Every evening, Petyr reported to the Lannisters his findings and a new case summary regarding any possible leads and assumptions made. He was prone to listening in to gossip amongst the students and faculty. Trying to catch any sort of hints to the _tragic accident_ that befell the school.

            In the days since taking the job, he had to admit he wasn’t getting anywhere. But that wasn’t what the Lions wanted to hear. So of course Petyr strung together snippets of gossip and notes and far-fetched assumptions. A tale of wonder that was ever-shifting, always changing each time he reported. One student was the suspect, and then another, and then the possibility of a teacher.

            That was his job, of course. Weaving half-truths and evidence into the story that a client wanted to hear. It was a wonder that the Lannisters – such regulars for Petyr – believed a lick of what he said during his reports.

            Petyr meanwhile had a solid hunch on the _actual_ culprit. The actual person with hands bloody from the untimely death of the poor Tommen. The _why_ was uncertain. The real why wasn’t important – Petyr would create the why that fit his whimsy.

            He just needed the _proof_ to back up the accusation. The shred of truth that made whatever story believable. That, and taking the time to milk the Lannisters of their wealth made dealing with these raucous children and the exam he was currently passing out worth it.

            Joffrey hadn’t submitted his lines. He hadn’t even told his mother, which Petyr suspected to hear an earful during last night’s report. Not a peep. The little Lion was far, far more trouble than he was worth. If only the death threats were sent to this brother instead of the other.

            But then, Joffrey wouldn’t have been the sort child to accept the anonymous threats. If anything, _he_ would have been sending them out.

            And so he sat, chair tipped and desk clean of even a pencil – untouchable, impossible to tear down. Petyr set the test on Joffrey’s desk, restraining the itching desire to trip the chair’s legs and set the boy tumbling.

            Just as Sansa did earlier.

            She was in the back row, directly behind Joffrey. Perhaps that’s why Petyr had never noticed her before. She was always in the shadow of the class’ nuisance. He tried to think on whether or not Sansa ever spoke up or raised her hand. Maybe. But all Petyr would see when he glanced in that direction was Joffrey.

            He set the test down on her desk. There was an _itch_ inside of Petyr. As impossible that itch was earlier to set Joffrey falling from his high self-confidence, so too was the itch to brush past Sansa. To trail a hand across that lithe arm reaching for a pencil to write her name. To comb his fingers through the endless waves of red - curls that were both meticulously tamed and yet untamed and running free over her shoulders.

            Petyr gripped onto the pile of tests as a means to tamp down that itch. He couldn’t ignore it – it was there, it was always there since he helped her to her feet. A pestering _thing_ that seemed as sudden and unexplainable as the death he was investigating. But now that it was made known, Petyr couldn’t help but want to _indulge_. To scratch and tear his skin until his own flesh bled from desire.

            He moved down the next aisle, setting tests down one by one. The edges were creased from his fingers.

            “You have until the end of class,” Petyr announced after he returned to the front. “If you finish early, flip it over and sit quietly. Read a book, sleep, whatever. You may begin.”

            The silence was broken by the turning of pages; by errant coughs and a pencil broken then sharpened.

            Petyr sat at his own desk, flipping through his notebook on the case. A small book filled with scribbled notes, written in his own shorthand. He opened the folded news-clipping of the suicide, comparing it with the news-clipping from another paper. Words he’d underlined continued to stare at him in a mockery.

            His gaze glazed over the classroom, thinking. Trying to imagine junior high-aged Petyr Baelish falling from six stories. Jumping in front of a moving truck. Slitting his own wrists.

            Years ago, he considered it. He _tried_ it. Not of his own volition, of course. Petyr was overcome with the embarrassment and shame of stories failing him. Of the fairytales where the boy always got what he wanted. What he was deserving of.

            Young Petyr was not deserving of love from such a beautiful girl.

            He hated the color red. The color of _her_. The color of his skin after the other kids beat him behind the school’s cafeteria. The color of the bricks he threw up against, with thoughts of taking back those words, those feelings. The color of the blood that oozed from his wrists.

            He always thought himself the _coward_ for not going through with it.

            Not anymore. The faint lines running down Petyr’s forearms were an infinite reminder of the pain and sorrow he had to undergo in order to emerge as someone better. Someone who didn’t believe in those fairytales. Someone who wrote the stories.

            Someone who survived.

            Petyr focused on the classroom again. He hadn’t realized he’d been zoning out for so long – half the time was already gone.

            No one was finished yet. The screw of frustration set into each child’s face was almost comical. Part of Petyr wanted to tell these children that learning how to solve for slopes was a pointless waste of their time.

            But that wasn’t his job. He wasn’t a teacher. He didn’t actually _care_.

            His eyes roamed across the room once more. Joffrey took up Petyr’s advice of sleeping. It would be a miracle if the boy even bothered to write his name down. Petyr wondered just how far Joffrey was going to get through life with such a terrible attitude and insipid belief that he was the center of the world.

            Petyr pushed those thoughts out. Glancing over the pile of gold lying beneath the towering pile of red.

            Red – the cascade of red falling all around her. Consuming her in an unburning fire.

            How he wanted to part those endless waves. To lift her chin and see her face. To look at her, to _touch_ her. Admiring this new, impossible discovery – a new _something_ , a new definition of a hidden emotion Petyr was sure he would never feel again.

            The color red had such a different meaning now. It wasn’t the sight of laughter and embarrassment aimed at him. The blood trickling from nose or wrist. The fear of who he was.

            Sansa lifted her head, her gaze still concentrated on the test before her. She raised her delicate arm, connected to her smooth hand, setting the pencil to her mouth. Gently pressing the eraser into her soft lips. Her brows furrowed, face scrunched at trying to remember some formula or method.

            She glanced around, towards Petyr. He had shifted his eyes towards the forgotten notebook in his hands, flipping through the pages and pretending to make sense of the words scribed in there. But he paid those words little attention. Over the top of the notebook Petyr continued to stare at Sansa. Stare as she made sure the coast was clear before peering – not so furtively – at her neighbor’s test.

            Petyr couldn’t help the smile that spread across his lips.

            Sansa Stark – a model of perfection, a shining example for what a _proper young lady_ should aspire to. Cheating, and so blatantly.

            Oh, this was going to be _fun_.

* * *

            “Ms Stark, may I have I word?”

            Her cheeks flushed into a pinker shade of her hair. More like the shade of her lips that were parted. Petyr saw a feather of panic course through Sansa’s face before she tamped it down.

            Petyr was righting the collected tests on his desk, arranging them to lie in the same direction. A final straggler handed her test to him and nearly sprinted out the door in embarrassment. Petyr couldn’t help but notice how much white space was left on her paper.

            He took his time. Letting the _panic_ swirl within Sansa – all the _what if_ s tumbling through her mind, he was sure. She toyed with the gaudy bracelets on her wrists. Petyr flipped through each test, as if examining and measuring the students’ aptitude. The silence was filled only with the rustle of paper and the incessant (and rather annoying) pulse of blood through veins.

            Satisfied, he finally set the stack back down on the desk. Petyr gave a cursory glance at the door. It was closed.

            His attention finally fell on the girl standing before him. The dread present before seemed to multiply exponentially upon Sansa’s features. Petyr watched as she slid her tongue, slowly, over her bottom lip.

            “Do you know why I’ve called you back, Ms Stark?”

            Of course she wouldn’t. But Petyr wouldn’t pass on the chance to _play_ with her nerves. Sansa shook her head. Her fingers paused their ministrations over the flashy beads, but they stayed about her wrist.

            Petyr leaned back, resting one leg over the other. “I do believe, Ms Stark, that _cheating_ is against the honor code of this institution.”

            What Petyr would have given to capture that look of terror. The blue of her eyes seemed to vanish beneath the white. The warm flush disappeared into a cold, white sheet across her skin. Petyr was sure she stopped breathing for several heartbeats.

            He saw her fingers tighten over the bracelets. Finally, Sansa spoke: “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr Baelish.”

            The guilty always deny the crimes, don’t they?

            Petyr pushed back on the smile that was forcing its way onto his lips. “No?” He gathered the stack of tests again, thumbing for two in particular. He made sure to place them one after the other during his perusal earlier. “Well, Ms Stark, then would you please explain how you and Ms Poole wrote the _exact_ same solution to number three, please?”

            He set the tests side by side, indicating the two girls’ answers. Sansa had the same wrong solution with the same wrong steps. Flipping the equation for slope was a simple mistake. But both girls also flipped the order of the coordinates, which wasn’t an impossible possibility. Certainly at least one other student made the same folly.

            The proof was there, written in her own hand.

            Sansa’s fingers were digging the bracelets into her skin. Digging so hard the colored plastic was working to bring an angry flush over her wrists. Petyr thought it cute at first. How impossibly inexperienced this girl was at hiding her lies. At the first sign of being caught, her body was already subconsciously working to expose her of her unspoken guilt.

            The irritated flush turned darker. Warmer. _Redder_.

            Petyr swore under his breath. He sat up, ignoring the insignificant issue of cheating. His hands were reaching for her own before she flinched away.

            The terror in her eyes was overwhelming.

            Sansa’s breath was coming out short and fast, her chest threatening to rip from her heart. She took a step back, two.

            It was like looking into a mirror from the past.

            “Ms Stark, if I may–”

            She was pulling away further, arm clutched against her chest. Sansa was going to bleed over her uniform.

            Petyr could feel the panic rising in his own chest, too. The fear of being caught for trying to _relieve_ the pain in his head and heart. Angry lines across skin.

            He didn’t know her at all. Who she was, what she liked, what her family and friends thought of her. However, what Petyr did know was that those _marks_ weren’t the cause of nothing. Something or someone was leading Sansa’s fingers to strike lines across her wrists.

            Petyr had a moment’s pause before lifting the cuff of his sleeve. He had always worn long-sleeved shirts and jackets, despite the humidity of the city. Never would Petyr reveal that weakness of his youth. Yet here he was, rolling the fabric away. “It’s okay,” he said, showing her the _similarity_ between the two of them. The solidarity in persons cast out for who they were.

            Sansa stopped moving away. Her own wrist was still clutched, fingers digging into the fabric and below into the skin. She wanted to pull herself out and away, he could tell.

            “It’s okay,” Petyr repeated. Slowly he edged around the desk, stopping before her. He rose the exposed arm before her, letting the fluorescent lights pick up the faint white lines etched there.

            Sansa couldn’t stop _staring_ at them. Petyr continued, his voice soft, “You’re going to be alright, sweetling.” _Sweetling_ – what a ridiculous word. It was soft, though. A gentle word meant to calm the wild panic running through Sansa.

            She moved her gaze slowly, so slowly, from the wrist to Petyr’s eyes. Sadness coated her own, a mask for the terror and loneliness underneath.

            He lowered his arm, not bothering to cover his forearm. Perhaps it was a gesture of familiarity – that Petyr was affected, too, and wasn’t going to hide who he was from Sansa. Perhaps he wanted to invoke not sympathy, but _trust_.

            “Sweetling, I’m not upset about the test.” What did Petyr care about tests for a class he wasn’t technically teaching? Besides, he would be long gone before the tests would be graded and passed back. So he hoped. “Everyone cheats, it’s fine.”

            Sansa was shocked by that. Her lips parted as if to speak, but didn’t.

            “However,” he continued, “I’m more concerned about who or what is making you feel like… like the pain is necessary.” Like the pain is a necessary relief from the horrors of reality. From remembering how _pitiful_ she was.

            She licked her lips. Her wrist was still clutched, but the fingers grasping it loosened. They stopped clawing at her chest at least. “I… It’s no one.”

            Petyr glanced behind her, towards the back of the class. Towards her desk. He wondered if he would find his _proof_ hidden behind the books inside. He looked back at Sansa. “Sweetling, it’s _not okay_ for someone to make you feel terrible. It’s _never_ okay.”

            Look at him. First a teacher, and now a counselor. If the faux-detective business ever flopped, Petyr would have alternatives at least.

            He clasped his hands at the lip of the desk behind him, fingers digging into the wood. Oh, how he was itching to grab onto her arms, to raise her wrists to his mouth and ease the pain away from her skin. To erase the memory – physical and mental – of what that _someone_ was doing to her.

            Child killer – that was another alternative.

            So Petyr sat, swallowing a lump of saliva down a dry throat. So he sat, wanting desperately to make amends for this girl. For his own self.

            Sansa licked her lips again. “I…” she began. There was a tremble in her voice. Her head moved back, looking at her own desk – or perhaps at the door and her escape. Long seconds dragged before she turned to face Petyr again. Her words were so soft he wasn’t sure they were actually spoken. “Please don’t tell anyone.”

            Would he? _Should_ he?

            Yes, he _should_. That was the teacher conduct – to report signs of abuse and mistreatment in students.

            But Petyr wasn’t a teacher.

            He nodded. “Of course, sweetling.”

            Her feet shuffled her away from Petyr, back towards the last line of desks. Sansa nearly collided with a chair, so lost in her thoughts.

            Petyr followed her. She fished insider her desk with her non-bleeding arm. The other, Petyr could see, had left smudges of red across her blouse. A red so much darker than her hair, but just as alive. So stark and _there_ , for all the world to see.

            Sansa pulled out her textbook and old homework. Petyr couldn’t help but notice how, as the dates on the homework were earlier in the year, her marks were better. The decline was a gradual thing over weeks, _months_.         

            Petyr gripped the edge of her desk. For support. For channeling the fiery blood running in him. He hadn’t been here when it began, hadn’t even known Sansa or cared for her. But there was a knife, a series of knives, clawing and stabbing within Petyr. He didn’t want her to succumb to that darkness Petyr knew all too well.

            She finally found a small crumple of paper. It was balled incredibly small, the paper soft from countless touches and presses.

            _Die wolf Bitch_

            That was one note. There were several, all amounting to the sort of _worth_ the sender thought of Sansa.

            Petyr saw the sting of tears at her eyes. She tried to blink them away. To hide the weakness she was displaying for Petyr. For someone she didn’t even know.

            Sansa opened the last one and crumpled it just as quickly.

            He didn’t want to _force_ her to reveal the note. But it was evidence of the crime, regardless of the meanness of words. It was also a reminder of the pain Sansa was going through, as plain as the scars and the blood and the tears that were snaking down her cheeks.

            “Sweetling, it’s okay. You’re okay.”

            Petyr’s arms were moving before he realized. They wrapped around Sansa’s small form, her body shuddering with the release of tears and pain. He felt her hand clutch at his shirt, felt her eyes dampen the material. Sansa was letting everything go. Showing herself to Petyr – the fragile thing beneath her perfect mask. How well-made the mask was, yet how delicate its hold had been across her face.

            He held her, drawing slow circles with the flats of his palms across her back. Petyr whispered, “It’s okay, it’s alright,” into her hair. At one point, Sansa winced from his ministrations across her back.

            On and on she cried. Months of bottled emotions, of never being able to confide in anyone.

            Minutes passed before she stopped crying, stopped shaking in Petyr’s arms. Slowly she removed herself, scrubbing at her cheeks and eyes. Sansa’s entire face was flush – especially the whites of her eyes. A sea of red with a terrified center of blue, threatened to be swallowed entirely.

            She was so delicate. So tired.

            But strong.

            Sansa was _alive_.

            So he told her, assuaged her fears and the gnawing voices in her mind.

            Petyr’s hands were at her shoulders. The warmth within Sansa seeped into his skin. His head was moving before he could stop himself, before his mind could yell _no_.

            Sansa’s forehead was hot, her skin smooth. Petyr pressed the softest kiss against her skin, letting his lips linger over her flesh. She hadn’t moved from his touch, and she hadn’t flinched away.

            “I promise he won’t harm you anymore, sweetling.”

            Petyr moved away his head and hands. Sansa’s gaze was focused on nothing, on everything. On the fading warmth of Petyr’s lips upon her forehead. On the mirrored soul standing before her.

            She hadn’t seen Petyr pocket the crumpled note.

            Petyr collected the rest and offered them to Sansa. It was her choice, her life dictated by a faceless coward. Sansa could let them fester in the dark confines of her desk, an ever-present reminder of who she was to _someone unimportant_. Or she could toss them, grind them into their empty worth beneath her fingers.

            Sansa took the notes, one at a time from Petyr’s palm, and ripped each until they were only scraps of dust.

* * *

            Petyr sat in his apartment, staring at the fading graphite between his fingers.

            The paper had become soft under his grip, folding and unfolding, smoothing and crumpling. He wanted to tear it into infinitesimal pieces. He wanted to burn them. He wanted to do so many _worse_ things – not to the paper, but to the person responsible.

            Mostly, Petyr wanted to erase the words and their harm from Sansa.

            He couldn’t. Of course he couldn’t. They were a part of her, just as the harm and hurt of Petyr’s past would always be a part of him.

            Still, the _audacity_ for someone to slip terrible words into the minds of Sansa and Tommen and who knew who else…

            This note Petyr pocketed was the worst:

            _Don’t scream so much next time bitch_.

            An endless list was running through Petyr’s mind. Of the wounds he couldn’t see on her expose skin, beneath it. Of what else was being done to her that made the cuts seem an appropriate way out of reality.

            He crumpled the paper again. His fingers squeezed it, as small and tight and insignificant as possible.

            He unfolded it, smoothing the wrinkles. Staring at the words that were starting to fade.

            Petyr set it aside and began pacing the room.

            It was still early in the evening. Petyr would be expected to make his report to the Lannisters soon. If he didn’t call, they would. And they would demand _results_. A week of pretending to be a teacher, of pretending to care about the future and well-being of students. That’s what they gave him.

            But what would they give him in return for the _truth_?

            It was there, lying on his desk. Lying atop the other paper Petyr used to cross-reference the handwriting. They matched.

            Petyr ran fingers through his hair, down his face, behind his neck. His feet moved of their own accord, round and round in circles.

            There _was_ an alternative.

            It was terrible.

            It was _more than_ terrible.

            He would be kicked off the force. Kicked out of the city and the country. Locked up. Murdered.

            Petyr kept telling himself _no_ – the logical part of his brain was trying to drill sense into Petyr. That part of the brain dictated his life for so long, it _was_ him. Everything Petyr was, everything he built up for himself.

            Then that withered, _unused_ part eased its way back in. Whispering atrocious words, threading a plot around and around his mind. Weaving ideas with a string as red as fire.

            Again his fingers moved: hair, face, neck.

            Again he made a circuit of his room.

            Petyr was going _mad_.

            The fact that he was even _debating_ the possibility and thinking on the consequences of both actions.

            He wanted to scream. To kick something, everything.

            Any time he closed his eyes, he saw her. Sprawled upon the floor, legs parted in such an innocent, _indecent_ angle. Standing terrified, clutching her bleeding arm, fear flowing from her being. Wrapped within his arms, crying, revealing the broken pieces of herself to an equally broken man.

            She was in everything. Red: silky and flowing as boundless as the setting sun. Blue: as vast and impossible as all of the oceans of the world. White: as smooth and pale as ivory, tinged with the softest pinks.

            He laughed. Oh, yes. Petyr definitely _was_ mad.

            In the roar of the madness in his mind, he almost didn’t hear his phone ring.

            Petyr stared at the name before lifting it to his ear, grabbing the smoothed paper with his other hand. Raising it before him to stare at the words as he answered. To stare at the faded lines across his wrist.

            “Have you found the killer?” the voice on the other line spat out.

            Petyr swallowed. He felt his heart thrumming in his head.

            “Yes.”

* * *

            Petyr wasn’t sure whether he was nervous or relieved to walk back into that classroom Monday morning.

            His mind had been a warzone of emotions and fears and possibilities. So many impossible threads winding through and tangled within. So many _what if_ s hiding, lurking, waiting for Petyr to fall unawares.

            The first classes went by uneventfully. Petyr hadn’t bothered to lecture – he didn’t think he would be able to string together a coherent sentence, let alone an entire spiel on lines and equations. Instead he set up his computer to play some sort of math-related videos. He was certain the students paid about as much attention as Petyr did to the class.

            The clock counted down the hours, the minutes until the next class. His vision switched between staring at it and staring at nothing.

            He wanted to know the consequences. He wanted nothing to do with it.

            When the bell rang, Petyr realized he was absentmindedly running fingers over the lines of his wrists.

            The sixth graders shuffled out, confused by their strange teacher acting even stranger. Petyr finally realized that during that lecture-that-wasn’t, students had raised their hands and asked questions.

            He hadn’t noticed.

            And now he had to. Watching as the next class shuffled in, one student, two.

            Who was Petyr looking for? For the terrible child that might have gotten away scot-free? For the poor girl that might have met her end over the weekend from an _accident_? For his superiors, coming to sentence his ass to prison or death?

            For something to change. For nothing.

            How different Petyr was this week. How much he actually _cared_.

            His heart leaped. His body almost did, too.

            She was okay.

            She wasn’t _dead_.

            Sansa moved to her desk, not looking at Petyr, not looking at anything. There wasn’t anything on her face to indicate any _accident_ , nothing on her neck or her arms or legs. The bracelets were still there, and Petyr thought he saw a bandage over one.

            But there were so many ways to hurt someone without the damage seen. So many ways Sansa already was hurt and torn and barely hanging on.

            She settled in her seat, hands rummaging through her desk.

            Petyr’s heart sank. Had the bastard not been caught? Not been sentenced to the consequences of his own doing? Was there another note, neatly folded atop a textbook, spelling out the sorts of dealings Sansa was to be met with later on? Spelling out, again, that Sansa was better off dead?

            Ice formed within Petyr’s veins, freezing his heart.

            After finally learning that no, Sansa was not worthless – was she going to succumb to the darkness? To the final end?

            Sansa removed the textbook and her pencils. She glanced up towards Petyr, her hair following her movements.

            And she smiled.

            Petyr smiled back.

            It vanished when he saw who walked in next.

            Petyr rose to his feet, hands flat atop the desk. The dread that had momentarily coiled around his chest came back even harder.

            Cersei stormed through the door, shoving aside the children as she went. At least one student fell to the ground.

            Where Sansa burned with a soft warmth, Cersei exploded with intensity. And that fire was writ all over her face, all in her movements.

            Aimed at Petyr.

            He moved to intercept her, to guide her outside and speak like proper grown-ups. His arm was heading to grab onto Cersei’s wrist when she smacked it away.

            Her hand stroke against Petyr’s face with a resounding _crack_. Students gasped. Cersei’s eyes bore into Petyr, through him. He could see the fire coursing within her.

            Petyr rubbed at his cheek, rubbed over his mouth to hide the _smile_.

            “Ma’am,” he said sternly. Petyr moved to grab her wrist and lead her outside, but she smacked him away again. “Ma’am. Please, let’s discuss whatever issue you have outside in privacy.”

            She was about to decline – he could see it in the tightness of Cersei’s lips. Instead she huffed and stormed outside.

            The hall wasn’t empty of students yet, nor had Petyr closed the door completely. That didn’t stop Cersei.

            “What in seven hells do you think you’re doing?”

            Petyr was sure every person in the school was going to be part of the conversation, whether they wanted to or not. He leaned against the door, arms crossed. “I’m sorry?”

            She approached, shoving a finger into his chest. In those seconds, Cersei managed to temper her anger into a seething whisper. “Why did you arrest my son without informing me?”

            Oh, did she want the _truth_?

            Truth: because had I told you, you would have weaseled your way with any and all power-holding officials to get your son off the hook, and to have someone more crooked than me place the guilt on someone innocent.

            Instead, he said, “Because that is the procedure of law. I found the guilty party, and I sent in for his arrest.”

            Cersei’s finger was digging, clawing into Petyr. “That’s not why I hired you.”

            Truth: no, you hired me because you _knew_ your son bullied your other son into suicide, and needed to find the proof in order to burn it.

            “You hired me to find the person responsible. I did.”

            Petyr heard footsteps beneath the thrumming of his heart. Student? Teacher? Police?

            Her finger jabbed harder. “Then, you go and lie and say my son’s _raped_ that dumb bitch?” Her voice was growing, the anger impossible to ignore. “Where’s your _proof_?”

            Behind him, Petyr heard the scuffle of shoes and bodies. Math was infinitely more boring compared to the drama ensuing just beyond their door. Cersei wasn’t lowering her voice anymore. And she was so close – the children on the other side could definitely hear every word.

            Sansa would know that he _told_ her secret. That he broke his promise.

            Petyr wanted to lash out, too.

            He took in a deep breath, letting the anger swirl within him. He shoved one hand into a pocket, using the other to swat Cersei’s fingers off his chest. He had one shot at this.

            “Tell me,” his voice was quiet, Cersei had to lean in. Petyr felt the heat of her anger in the inches between them. “Was it Joffrey’s idea or yours to harass innocent students?” Cersei tried to pull back in offense, but Petyr’s grip on her hand tightened, pulling her back. “Perhaps you hadn’t meant to have Joffrey sexually assault at least one girl, but you _did_ mean to have him attack and push others into suicide. How _convenient_ they were all children of noble families. How _convenient_ at least one of them was contemplating suicide before your son beat her to it.” Petyr could tell his grip was hurting, his fingers digging into Cersei’s once-pristine flesh. But he needed to – he couldn’t contain his anger in the quietness of his voice. “Would you have kept going if Tommen hadn’t been the first child to die? Did he get in the way of your plans?” A final tug at her. “Did you dispose of your own _weak link_?”

            Cersei yanked her hand free, and Petyr let her. She struck at him. And again. He caught her before the third strike, taking that as proof enough of guilt.

            But he needed her _words_.

            “Tell me, Cersei, have you ever had thoughts of killing yourself? It’s not fun.” _Say it_. “Why do you think it’s okay to tell little children to?” _Say it_. “Why would you ever condone such a thing?”

            “Because, you useless piece of nothing, they’re all in the way. Democracy – pah! Who needs families meddling when we’re practically in charge? A pity that wolf bitch didn’t finish the job.”

            It took all of Petyr’s willpower not to crush the life out of Cersei. To wring the neck of such a terrible human being.

            No. _This_ way was better.

            He let her hand go, and smiled. “Thank you.”

            Cersei looked confused, unsure. Petyr pulled out his phone and hit _stop_ on the recording app. Realization dawned on her – he had her confession, words just enough to have questions pointed at her and her family and their _reign_.

            Cersei lunged for Petyr. Her hands aimed to rip his throat out and to destroy the evidence.

            Arms grabbed Cersei from behind. She was hoisted inches above the ground. Her limbs thrashed, clawing at the newcomer.

            She was finished.

            Petyr dusted invisible specks from the front of his shirt. He tried to calm the erratic beating of his heart, calm the irrational fear that Cersei might incriminate Petyr, too. She might still. The police would have to question her in their investigation, and certainly all the _wonderful_ tasks Petyr has done for the Lannisters over the years would be brought to light. Not because they were of import to this case. No, Cersei would do it just to _spite_ Petyr. Outlining every single deal and deed, for getting her caught. For ruining her plans.

            Petyr had enough of this work, anyways.

            “Thank you, Lothor,” Petyr said to the man holding Cersei. “Now, if you will.” He motioned down towards the front office.

            He took a few steps before the sound of the door opening made him pause.

            Petyr turned around.

            Sansa and other students poked through the opening. He didn’t notice them – didn’t care about them. Perhaps others in that class were also affected by Cersei’s machinations. Perhaps a thorough search would reveal countless notes crumpled with the same words of _die die die_. A shame on Cersei’s part for not having someone else write the threats. A foolish shame.

            Petyr only stared at the curtain of red framing perfect ivory skin, and the streak of red lips. He thought they turned in a smile.

            His chest was still pounding, but not from anger.

            He called to no one in particular as he left: “Don’t destroy the classroom while I’m gone. Also, you all get A’s on your last exam.” It didn’t matter, after all. He could have flunked them all. Petyr wasn’t a real teacher, anyways.

* * *

            Petyr stood watching Lothor and the King’s Landing authorities cuff and lead Cersei out of the school and out of his life. He had to render his cell phone, given that it had the _evidence_ needed to at least start a thorough investigation. Petyr made sure to clear the phone of anything improper and illegal. At the least, that way it would be more difficult to prove Petyr’s involvement in other hideous crimes over these years.

            Part of him would miss it. His life, built on years of worming his way into the pockets and purses of the biggest families of Westeros.

            It began here. Not _here_ precisely. But with a little boy dreaming dreams far too large for himself. With a little boy who, despite himself, chose not to embrace the cold finality of death.

            As he stood there, watching nothing in particular, he felt the presence of someone else.

            He knew it was her. That unexplained sensation of thinking on someone, bringing them there. _Speak of the devil, and the devil will appears_ – that was the phrase.

            But that wasn’t Sansa. Petyr was the devil of King’s Landing, the horrible shadow in the stories and endings of so many lives over the years. Crafting tales and threads of misery for men and women he hardly even knew. Tales that hundreds of people never would have _considered_ Petyr to be the center of.

            Perhaps instead, Sansa had been thinking of Petyr. And as she thought of the devil, so he appeared.

            Petyr checked the clock. There was another hour of school left. Sansa should be in class, pondering over her readings and vocabulary.

            But she was here.

            “Shouldn’t you be in class?” he asked with the faintest turn of a smile on his lips.

            “I don’t feel well to be in class.” Sansa adjusted the strap of her bag. It caught over the collar of her shirt, lowering the fabric from her neck. Petyr stared at exposed skin. He shook his gaze away. Had she done that on purpose? No – it was an accident.

            Petyr gazed around the empty office. The administration was outside watching the proceedings, gossiping about the Lannisters and the suicides and who knew what else. The room seemed to grow smaller. “Shall I call your parents for you?”

            She shook her head. “They aren’t in the city.”

            Petyr stared at her in confusion. Of course they weren’t here – the family home was up North. Which meant Sansa was miles and miles away from home…by herself? “You have siblings, right? Will one of them be picking you up?”

            Sansa shook her head. “They aren’t here, either.”

            He looked at the clock again, tried to remember when the staff left the room. Petyr had already informed them of his resignation, and apologized for the ruse. They understood, if not without an endless supply of exacerbated huffing.

            His gaze fell back on Sansa. “How will you be getting home?”

            She scratched at her neck, rubbing fingers along the length, from jaw to collarbone. They rested there finally, one finger drawing lazy circles in the hollow of her throat. “You saved me, didn’t you?”

            Petyr snapped his eyes back onto hers, tried to focus on falling within the endless oceans. Her lazy motions were threatening to pull his eyes away into the unknown. “I… Yes. Joffrey and his family won’t be able to hurt you or anyone anymore.”

            The seconds dragged on before Sansa spoke again. “Do they go away?”         

            “The Lannisters? They should, after all of the things they’ve done-”

            “No.”

            Petyr’s mouth was left parted in confusion. “No?”

            She dropped her hand finally, pulling the bracelets from her wrist. Blood was seeping into the bandage. “The scars.”

            Petyr’s fingers moved to his own. He never let his heal, never let the pain stop. It made him feel _alive_ ; it made him _feel_. That cold, empty numbness crawling inside him never left. It was always there. It still was. But Petyr had learned to live with it, to hide it away in the recesses of his mind and forget.

            The two of them were rubbing at their wrists. “They will, if you let them heal.”

            Sansa rummaged for a clean bandage, peeling the bloody one off. “Okay,” was all she said as she changed it.

            There were voices growing closer. Petyr had spent too long standing and staring. He moved to reach a hand out before thinking better of it. “Here, I’ll drop you off at home.” Petyr moved towards the side exit, not checking to see if Sansa would follow. He had a feeling she would.

            The door closed behind them just as the front entrance opened and the staff entered. Petyr sighed in relief.

            They headed to his car in silence, moving quickly to avoid suspicion. Or, moving quickly might have been more suspicious. If anything, Petyr was thankful that all of the police had left. He wouldn’t want to start his life as a wanted criminal quite so soon.

            Which left him wondering on his future. Petyr had more than enough saved over the years. He could run and run and run. A different country or two. He would need to brush up on his laws, on which lands pardoned immigrants of their past transgressions. Unless of course Cersei went into excrutiatingly minute detail of every transgression Petyr had a part in. That would void out almost everywhere.

            Petyr slammed on the brakes.

            He had been so lost in his own thoughts, he forgot about the girl sitting beside him. Quiet, staring at Petyr with her own head tilted. As if Sansa was observing him.

            “Sh- crap. Sorry, sweetling, I forgot to ask where you lived.”

            Petyr then had a thought that perhaps Sansa lived _on_ campus, in one of the few dormitories allowed for out-of-city students. She must have. But at this point, Petyr would have to wait until the school cleared for the day before driving back with a child in his car. Or, maybe waiting would be _more_ suspicious.

            “Turn left up ahead,” she said.

            Petyr followed her directions through the streets, winding his way through the jumble of King’s Landing. Meanwhile, Sansa sat and observed, moving only to lower the window. Petyr had to keep his eyes ahead – keep his eyes from watching how the wind whipped at the wild beauty of red about her face. At how the sun kissed Sansa’s nose and cheeks, giving them the perfect tint of pink.

            “Right, and it’s the last house on the street.”

            Petyr slammed on his brakes _again_.

            “Wait, sweetling,” he said, pulling his car to the curb and waving an angry driver by. His fingers gripped tightly on the steering wheel, thoughts racing in his mind. “You live with the Lannisters?”

            How hadn’t he known? Petyr knew _everything_.

            He turned to face her, and was met only with the sheepish grin imaginable. It was made more ridiculous by the lazy strands clinging to her jaw. “Did I forget to mention that?”

            As much as he wanted to laugh at her jesting, he felt the cold weight in his heart. Petyr was worried for her safety at school, without realizing that she never was safe from Joffrey.

            Which meant, Sansa might have overheard conversations.

            Which meant, Sansa might have had her own game to play against the Lannisters. She certainly had reason to. _Don’t scream so much next time bitch_ , were the words echoing in Petyr’s brain.

            A terrible thought snaked into Petyr’s mind. Worse than any thought from the past week. Worse than what he had been _so close_ to giving up entirely on Friday evening.

            “Sansa, sweetling,” he began. That nagging, logical part of his brain told him to _stop_. That knowing the answer wouldn’t help, wouldn’t change the tangle of threads that Petyr already wove. But he had to know. “Sweetling, do you know what happened to Tommen?”

            Sansa cocked her head away from Petyr, gazing lazily across the street towards the Keep. Sunlight bounced off her hair, framing her face in a shawl of light and fire. She was burning – burning, burning, burning. Brighter than fire and the sun and anything in the known universe.

            Slowly, she turned to face Petyr again. And Petyr knew. She hadn’t needed to speak a single word - that _smile_ was still there, crawling into her eyes, turning the ocean from something infinitely wonderful into a terrifying abyss. “Yes, Mr Baelish. I pushed him.”

            Speak of the devil – and here she was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all liked it!! Honestly, the ending scene sold this story for me. Depending on the responses, I might write a part 2.
> 
> (Also if there is anything else I should tag or something inconsistent in the themes, let me know and I'll fix it!)


	2. - and she shall appear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [So! I caved in and wrote a part 2 to this crazy story. I tried to answer some questions, but tbh I think I left more than when I started oops. TW for child kidnapping.  
> Also, thanks soooo much for the kind words on part 1!! Let me know what you think on this one! :D ]

 

            Petyr was trapped in a spiral of thoughts of his own making. There were endless possibilities and solutions and outcomes and _what if_ s that wended their way across the valleys and mountains in his mind. The threads of plots and persons and blackmail jumbled over and under and in between one another. Worse (or better?) was that amongst it all, Petyr could always spot the thread that burned _red_.

            And burn it did. Destroying so many carefully taut threads around it. With every passing moment it burned brighter and brighter.

            But what stuck out most like an incessant kernel of food between tooth and gum was her _smile_. That small turn of rosy lips. The endless depth of sea within her eyes as she turned to face him. The fire that engulfed her lithe frame.

            _I pushed him_ , Sansa had said.

            Petyr was so _sure_ of the reasons surrounding poor Tommen’s death. A suicide from the top of the highest peak in King’s Landing. A thorn in the Lannisters side for not being _ruthless_ and _reckless_ like the other Lions.

            Tommen, Petyr thought, was a fall from grace – metaphorically and literally. A fall to be mimicked and carried out by his older brother and mother. A loss of their hold on the city and the country.

            Now, Petyr questioned every thread running through his mind.

            “This way, sweetling,” Petyr motioned for Sansa to follow. Light still bounced about the city, setting the walls alight in a fiery sway of their own. Once, Petyr thought the reflections were impossibly bright and angry. Now, they paled in comparison to the fire striding beside him.

            He unlocked the door to his apartment – a small, but not cramped, set of rooms that Petyr had no intention of staying in for long. To be fair, he had already set up arrangements to move out of the city by the end of the year. A part of him would be saddened by leaving all the people and memories and exploitations behind. A bigger part of him was glad to burn the bridge between him and the King’s Landing forever.

            Now, the smaller part was growing. In size, in shape, in color. Were Petyr not attempting to stamp down the insistent _tug_ of this thread, he might have recognized it. The paleness of form, with spots of blue and red.

            Oh, but of course Petyr recognized its shape. He could not deny the sort of _thoughts_ that had been running wild within him since he first helped Sansa to her feet the week before. That was the moment, then. The moment when that insignificant part began to stir, to move, to awaken.

            Sansa followed Petyr inside without a word, without the underlying fear that he was sure would be present in her. He was practically _unknown_ to Sansa. A complete stranger, inviting a young girl into his home. Even with the few days they had briefly known each other, Petyr spent it as a lie.

            But they weren’t entirely unlike. The trauma each of them had undergone was a mirror. The pain and blood coursing from their bodies, too. They were two entirely separate creatures. And yet, they were not.

            Perhaps that was why Sansa entered without a lick of fear present in her.

            Petyr hesitated in closing the door - in locking the world out. He did, though, eventually.

            He leaned against it, watching as Sansa walked through slowly and observing his home. There wasn’t much to his apartment aside from the necessities. No frivolous decoration on the walls; no unnecessary knickknacks on tables; no signs of life and warmth. This place was a temporary reprieve for Petyr from the outside world. This place was never entered by someone except for Petyr. Except now.

            That larger part of Petyr hated allowing himself to weaken because of this girl. Hated that the cold, emotionless person that he forged himself into after all of the pain and tears – that that mask now had a single, hairline red crack running down it.

            “You can stay here for tonight, sweetling,” Petyr said, finally breaking the comfortable silence between them.

            Sansa turned on a heel and stared at him, tilting her head to the side. Auburn waves fell over her shoulders. Petyr felt that unnamed thread pull within him as his eyes met hers. She asked, “Is it okay?”

            She understood the very real implication of this sort of _arrangement_ that they were in. That Petyr led her into.

            People knew of the heartless, calculating man that existed in front of the mask Petyr had stitched onto his face. An endless list of people that he had ruined and exploited. So many of those people were _itching_ to see Petyr fall, yet lacking in the push to set him tumbling.

            Here was the ammunition.

            He should say: _no_. He should say: _it’s not okay at all, this isn’t right._ He should say: _what’s happened to you should never happen to a child_.

            Countless words Petyr should have spoken.

            “Yes,” was all that he said.

            Sansa continued to stare at him with those endless depths of blue. There wasn’t a speck of flotsam for Petyr to reach for as he fumbled in the sea.

            Petyr could tell there were countless words waiting to be spoken on her tongue, too. Countless questions and concerns. Alarms and warnings yelled for anyone of a non-questionable moral standing to help her. Instead, she asked “Are you taking me back to them?”

            He hadn’t realized his hands were clasped tightly until his fingernails began digging in harshly. He loosened their grip, if only a fraction. “No, sweetling. Those people won’t hurt you again.”

            Lies and empty promises. What else was Petyr good for?

            But Sansa’s grip loosened a bit, too. She didn’t have to know about the lies that seeped easily out of his mouth. Petyr hoped - somewhere in the empty cavern of where his heart once lay - that he wouldn’t have to lie to her about it. Lies of the pain Sansa had experienced being only the _beginning_.

            Her eyes broke contact to peruse his apartment again, a cursory glance. “Do you have a restroom?”

            Petyr couldn’t help but smirk at the odd way of asking. “Yes, this way.” He walked past her towards the short hallway, motioning to the door. He hadn’t needed direct her, but Petyr had a feeling she would have wandered about if he hadn’t. She might still.

            Sansa gave him a polite smile in thank you before closing the door behind her.

            He moved to straighten files. Hiding anything incriminating or dangerous from sight. Most of it already was arranged in folders and bins on shelves and in drawers. But this recent assignment was still in sight – whatever he hadn’t given to Lothor in the morning as reasonable cause to arrest Joffrey and by extension Cersei. Some of the documents still lay open on his desk. His notebook was open to the news-clippings of Tommen’s suicide.

            Petyr was back in the Keep. Striding through those halls as someone who owned the building rather than one who was employed by the owner. Oh, but he owned the ass of almost everyone in there. Secrets and lies and blackmail ran amok in that household of Lions. An intricate, never-ending series of threads that were so tangled up with one another. One snip, and the entire structure would collapse.

            He leaned out the window of the highest tower. Stared at the splotch of gold and red below. The crimson was still hot.

            Petyr asked how he fell. He hardly knew Tommen – the quieter of the Lannister children. Always in the shadow of someone louder and bigger and more demanding. Petyr had to hide the shudder of remembrance that itched at his wrists.

            Someone said the Lion fell himself. That he was being bullied in school. That he wasn’t the only one. That notes were being discovered in children’s desks and bags – often of kids who were not native to King’s Landing. There were a fair amount of children from far away attending that school, actually. Children who perhaps should have stayed in their own cities and learned. This school didn’t push the children away. Money was money. If the child’s family was willing to pay, why should the school deny an education?

            Except for Tommen. He was the outlier in the theory Petyr had brewed about the underlying truth to the notes. A theory he proved right: a family hungry for power and desperate to kill innocent _children_ to grasp at it.

            Petyr turned from the window and began heading down the tower, Lothor in tow. Some other Lannister servants were with him, too, perhaps even Cersei herself. She was as _devastated_ as a mother should be. Almost precisely so.

            The body wasn’t any better up close. Petyr had Lothor carefully examine Tommen’s wrists and arms for scars. Examine for any signs of abuse or torment, whether inflicted by someone else or himself.

            There weren’t any either of them could see.

            No one said anything about Tommen showing any unusual or unnatural behavior before his death. He hadn’t even left a note of goodbye.

            It wasn’t a suicide. But it was, according to Cersei and the news and to Petyr, too. His job was not to find out precisely who killed Tommen. Rather, who was sending these outlier notes.

            Of course, Cersei hadn’t specified _which_ notes Petyr had to investigate. _The notes_. That was all.

            Petyr left the servants to scrape Tommen from the stones, to wash away the blood and flesh. There was so much red – it stuck to everything, flowed everywhere. Petyr turned, and saw red flowing like a cascading waterfall from the head, set alight in the midday sun–

            Petyr snapped forward.

            At some point, he had leaned against the edge of the counter and turned the television on to the news. The words blurred into white noise.

            _Red_.

            It all blurred into the blood.

            Petyr felt his heart thrumming within him. Felt the ice flow underneath his fingers.

            She was there. She had always been there.

            Petyr tried to rewind his memory, to switch the angle of the camera. To force his past self to continue staring at the gore of a dead eight-year-old boy as the servants bent to clean his blood from the ground.

            There was only a flicker of red before Petyr turned away.

            A flicker of red a different hue. Duller than blood, but much brighter in the King’s Landing sun.

            _I pushed him_.

            She said it with the glimmer of a smile, and that same sun setting her hair ablaze.

            Sansa pushed Tommen. Sansa then helped to scrape what was left of him from the flagstones.

            Because she had to. Because she lived under Cersei’s roof, and Cersei wanted her dead. Cersei might not have realized that Sansa was the one to push her son to his death – if Cersei had known, Sansa would not have made it passed the weekend (which Petyr feared earlier this morning). Perhaps a punishment, a separate sort of _warning_ for Sansa. _Look, little dove, this is how you commit suicide. Only, don’t be as messy when you do it_.

            That had to be it. Sansa lived with the Lannisters not as a valued guest with a name nobler than the rest of Westeros combined. Rather, Sansa lived as a servant.

            Which meant she–

            Petyr didn’t want to think on the other kinds of _treatment_ she endured under the Keep’s roof. On how much like a servant the Lions treated someone like Sansa.

            Petyr thought on the death threats she received, and nearly gagged.

            “Mr Baelish?”

            The soft, quiet tones of Sansa’s voice broke through the turbulent clatter within Petyr’s mind. He returned to reality, vision filled with the soft shades of red and ivory set against the bleakness of his apartment. It took him several long moments to realize that the shade of her hair was several degrees darker than it should have been.

            And that the edges of her uniform clung to her arms and legs.

            How long had he been thinking?

            Petyr found his voice finally. “Did you take a shower, sweetling?”

            Sansa cocked her head in a gesture implying that his question was ridiculous. “Yes, Mr Baelish.” As an afterthought, she added, “I hope you don’t mind.”

            The most recent thoughts running through Petyr’s mind – on how horrific Sansa’s life had turned since she arrived in the South – were struggling for flotsam, too. Struggling to fight away the _other_ thoughts that wound their way into the forefront of his mind. On how smooth and nimble her limbs were. On how she sat on the floor, _too_ innocently, eyes wide and legs wider.

            Petyr shook them away. “No, sweetling, I don’t mind. But you should have said. I would have lent you supplies and clothes.”

            She seemed about to laugh, but caught herself. She kept the edges of her lips turned up. Strands of hair were plastered upon the side of her cheek, falling down onto the collar of her shirt. The tips were dripping water over the fabric, turning the blouse almost transparent. “No offense, Mr Baelish, but I don’t think your clothes would have fit.”

            How close he was to offering to buy her clothes. A replacement set, an entire wardrobe. What would the store clerks say about ice-cold Petyr Baelish buying shirts and skirts and dresses and undergarments in a size and gender much too small for himself?

            Not only that, but who would they inform to?

            Then – oh, of course there was a _then_. Then, there was the even more cockamamie idea of offering her his own wardrobe. Just a simple dress shirt to wear while her hair dried. It’d be too big for her – sleeves falling several inches too low - but not big enough to fall low enough across her legs. Perhaps it might have. The hem might have reached her knees if Sansa were a shorter girl. But she was tall for her age. His own shirt resting on Sansa’s shoulders would have fallen much higher than her knees. In his mind, the shirt’s hem was slowly creeping up her thighs, inch by inch.

            “No, you’re right,” Petyr said, cutting his thoughts short. He hated how _loudly_ he could hear the blood in his veins.

            Sansa’s eyes had wandered to the television by then. The early evening news program was winding down. Whoever the anchorwoman was was hinting at a _big news story_ that had just broken through regarding a _very important family_ in Westeros.

            All the alluding in the world couldn’t hide the knowledge that Cersei’s exploitation was about to be broadcast to the entire country.

            Underneath the pounding of Petyr’s heart and the fading jangle of the news station’s outro, Sansa’s voice cracked out a faint “ _Please_.”

            She wasn’t staring at Petyr, rather the television. Sansa had sat on the edge of the couch, arms straight against the cushion as if holding her upright. Her hair was soaking the back of her uniform.

            Petyr hadn’t the time to ask before Sansa continued: “Please don’t make me go back.”

            Every thought and thread and worry and fear that was coiling in Petyr’s mind – they were all screaming at him. He wanted to ask her questions on what her life was like in the Keep. And the Lions. And how she got away with pushing Tommen. And _why_ she pushed Tommen. And if she imagined pushing someone else. And how she planned to get away with it. And how they hurt her. And how often. And where. And if the nightmares she has bleed into reality. And-

            “Of course not, sweetling.”

            Tomorrow, perhaps. Or the next day. There would be time for Petyr to probe into Sansa’s aching wounds.

            Sansa had lived and done so much – and she had only lived to see twelve name-days. She was so _young_.

            And yet, as she sat there – staring at nothing in particular, with her hair extinguished of its color and wild curls tamped flat – Petyr couldn’t help but see a small and frightened boy with dark hair and dark eyes and red wrists.

            “I’ll keep you safe.”

* * *

            Petyr entered the station for the first time with fear in his chest.

            He had just come from dropping Sansa off at her school. She had been reluctant, as expected. Afraid. The school was nothing but misery and pain and memories Sansa was forced to relieve each and every day.

            Petyr had not dropped Sansa off at school, exactly. He could only imagine the uproar at the administration and parents (and other students) finding a near-stranger drop off an innocent girl at the front doors, with the hardly-hidden implication that Sansa _was not so innocent anymore_. Or, worse - had anyone seen Petyr escort Sansa to his car the day before – a _continuation_ of the whispered loss of innocence of a poor, frightened, defenseless child.

            The fact that there weren’t warnings and calls for Petyr’s arrest at least meant no one saw them yesterday. At least, he hoped.

            So Petyr dropped Sansa off at a store a few blocks down, with money to buy herself breakfast. More money than a seventh-grader would need for a pastry. Just-in-case money. _In case I can’t help you out any other way_.

            He then parked a block further away, staring at the entrance to the store. Ten minutes passed before Petyr spotted red curls peak above other parked cars. He saw her look around nervously. Look around nervously for _him_. He saw as Sansa, with a slew of reluctance, walked casually towards her school as though this was her normal everyday routine.

            Was it? Did the Lannisters force Sansa to wake before the crack of dawn and trek all those miles to her school? Through shady alleys and pass shadier men, not caring if one of them had their way with a girl so young and innocent?.

            Petyr’s fingers clenched around the steering wheel as he watched and waited.

            “Baelish, you fucker, where were you yesterday?”

            His feet stopped his body before his mind came back. Before him stood Janos Slynt, one of the city’s head officers. Slynt often thought of himself as the _commander_ of the King’s Landing force. A farce. Though Slynt was not unfamiliar with blackmailing and bartering, so long as the gold went into his own pockets. He and all the others strode through King’s Landing under the impression that they ruled the city just as much as the Lannisters. Oh, if they only knew the machinations Petyr designed for the city and the country. Then they’d be kissing Petyr’s ass rather than Cersei’s.

            “I had an urgent, personal issue come up,” Petyr said. A part of him almost said a _family_ issue. Anyone would have seen through that lie. There wasn’t anything close to _family_ in Petyr’s life for a long, long time.

            Slynt rose an eyebrow in disbelief. Petyr added “I should have rang in. Sorry, I got caught up.”

            “Fuck yes you should have rung. Had to pick up the slack on the paperwork you were supposed to do.” Read as: I actually had to do work instead of sit on my ass all day.

            “To be fair, Slynt, I did find the evidence needed to arrest both Cersei and Joffrey.”

            Slynt was far from amused. “Yeah? Good for doing your job, Baelish. You did jack shit else.”

            Petyr’s fingers were itching to strangle this man. To strangle so many of the haughty officers working in the city. They were about as holy and moral as Petyr was. Only, everyone else was blind only to their own greed and desires. Lothor was perhaps one of the few exceptions, though it did help that man’s salary was buffed with Petyr’s wealth.

            Petyr wanted to tell Slynt and everyone else to find to shove guns up their asses and pull the triggers. Instead, Petyr gave a semblance of a smile and said, “Let me finish whatever else paperwork needs to get done.”

            That seemed to appease Slynt, if only a bit. Petyr learned quickly that sucking up to Slynt (and filling the man’s hand with coin) was the easiest way to get him to bugger off or conveniently forget something. “Fine. But you don’t get to interrogate the fucks. Your fault for slacking yesterday.”

            That Petyr was fine with conceding. He had no intention of staying around until the Lannister case would be finalized. Could be weeks, could be months. The Lions had a lot of shit to unearth.

            The plan to leave by the year’s end shortened. Petyr made a mental note on all of the preparations needed to be made in order to escort himself out of the city and the country as soon as possible, without leaving a trace of his whereabouts. He knew plenty of men that had debts to be collected.

            _And Sansa_.

            Petyr’s fingers fumbled over the stack of papers he was sorting through when the cascade of red and shining blue crashed into his mind.

            What would he do about her?

            She wasn’t _his_. Sansa still had a network of a family back North and spread throughout Westeros. She was tied to so many people with far stronger bonds than the weak sort of connection Petyr tried to lasso upon her.

            Petyr was an ex-teacher-but-actually-corrupt-detective. She didn’t know about the corrupt part, and probably assumed at the detective bit. His entire existence for Sansa was built upon a _lie_.

            But he saved her. In one abstract sense of the word.

            That didn’t give Petyr the right the stake any sort of _claim_ over the Wolf. He was a transient creature in her life. A story to tell her future children and grandchildren about.

            If anyone knew of that nagging, pestering, annoying thread that _wanted_ Petyr to stake a claim on Sansa and never let go – Petyr would face a death most unkind.

            There was also that _familiar_ fate between the two of them. Wasn’t that worth more? Their shared misery of pain and scars. Scars that would never fade from skin or mind. Scars that Sansa would need to cover with bracelets and fabrics and _shame_.

            Would her family care about the pain the Lannisters subjected her through? Did they already _know_?

            Petyr wasn’t sure which scenario pained him more.

            Petyr wasn’t sure why the scenarios were flitting through his mind at all.

            _Thunk_. A mug tipped over. It was followed by swears as the drink flowed. Petyr turned to look as everyone else did. Only he didn’t see it as everyone else did.

            He watched as the coffee crept upon papers, bleeding upon their edges before being staunched by wadded napkins teemed with curses.

            Petyr watched as the paper had the faintest tint of brown along the edge. Watched as the paper had been so close to succumbing to utter destruction, so _willing_ to let the coffee run its course. And would have let it, if the office hadn’t extinguished the coffee.

            Petyr excused himself early for lunch to make a call. Several.

* * *

            “Fuck.”

            Petyr thought of the more _sympathetic_ people that he fucked over throughout the years. People who might have been willing to pull their owed strings for _two_ persons rather than just Petyr. They were willing to move the time forward several weeks. Some were already ready for Petyr to flee. But for two people? They all said _no_.

            He was about to run through the list of every single person that had a debt to pay him. His fingers itched across the numbers on his phone. Urging the mind above to set them to work.

            But that would take _days_ to get through them all.

            Petyr sat back down at his desk, running his hands over his face and through his hair. It was supposed to be _simple_. A get-away for two people out of the country with new passports and identities. A number of people could have – would have – done it for Petyr.

            His hands fell from hair back down across his face again before busying themselves in the mountain of paperwork and folders and utter _crap_ before him.

            Perhaps he should leave her…

            Yes.

            No.

            Yes.

            No.

            Petyr was certain the forms he filled in were utter nonsense, but he didn’t care. He should, somewhere deep down, he should.

            Not when images of red and white and pink and blue kept flittering past his eyelids each time he blinked. Even when his eyes stared blankly at the papers – all Petyr could see was Sansa.

            He couldn’t think straight. Perhaps it would be best if he left her behind.

            He could leave. Unnoticed. Untraceable. All those people would change their minds if Petyr rang back with a _Just kidding it’s only me fleeing Westeros_.

            If Petyr hadn’t needed to leave _now_ he could get them to change their minds about two people. Petyr had an endless list of blackmail he could use against an endless list of people.

            But Petyr hadn’t the time to set those blackmail options in motion. He hadn’t the time to get Sansa free too.

            Not without limiting his options. Not without possibly condemning himself.

            He could always send Sansa back to her family. Where she _should_ go. The Lannisters wouldn’t want her or have a need for her anymore. The Starks might even _forgive_ Petyr should he swagger into the frozen wastes of Winterfell with their eldest daughter in tow.

            Yet again, they might assume the worst of Petyr. They always had. Everyone did.

             A door slammed. Petyr jerked his head towards the fiery-face of Slynt storming towards the other side of the floor. He was yelling into his phone, words echoing incoherently about the room. Slynt was headed for the elevator, still yammering about _do you have any fucking proof_. Petyr thought Slynt was staring at him when the elevator doors closed. The glare was not a kind one.

            Petyr glanced back at the door Slynt had slammed.

            And froze.

            The interrogation rooms.

            Unless there was some other particularly bothersome case that could wound on Slynt’s nerves in the middle of a Tuesday, Petyr could guess what sorts of words were spoken to Slynt to rile him up. What sorts of _condemnations_ she accused a certain Petyr Baelish of.

            There wasn’t any more time for paperwork or brooding.

            Peytr had to leave. Now

            He moved as slow and as calmly as possible, stuffing the papers back in the folders. The pace was unbearably slow. But it was necessary. Petyr shoved the folders under his coat, pushed his chair back, and walked towards the stairs.

            His phone was out, sending a brief warning text to Lothor. A warning that Lothor might be implicated in crimes too.

            At this time of day, no one would be using the stairs. They weren’t air conditioned, and the floor they worked on was far too high to climb. No one used the stairs regardless. Still, it eased Petyr’s racking nerves to see and hear no one in the stairwell as he rushed down.

            Down and down and down, clinging on the railing as he spun between runs.

            By now the other heads along with arresting officers would have arrived with Slynt via the elevator. They would be sauntering towards Petyr’s desk in hopes of arresting a man far guiltier than Joffrey or Cersei or any combination of men and women in King’s Landing.

            If only Petyr could have gotten rid of Cersei instead of arresting her. If only Petyr had been the one to interrogate her - blackmail her remaining son and daughter as leverage to keep quiet.

            If only Petyr hadn’t met Sansa.

            He exploded out the door into the parking lot.

            This morning he swore at being late and having to park in the back. Now, he wanted to thank whichever gods gave him one grace.

            Petyr zoomed out of the station. He wove between cars and pedestrians, not caring at the angry swears and gestures aimed at this _madman_.

            There weren’t any sirens or shouts to _pull over_. Nothing. No sign that Petyr was being chased. No sign that Petyr was caught.

            Maybe they hadn’t caught him.

            Maybe Slynt was just pissed because that’s how Slynt was.

            Maybe. But maybe not.

            Petyr was nearly back at his apartment – tearing through stop signs and swerving across corners – when he nearly slammed on the brakes.

            He wanted to turn back.

            But he didn’t stop. Petyr kept his foot moving the car, hands steering himself further and further away.            

            He would need to call all those people back. Tell them that he _was_ kidding – Petyr would be alone.

* * *

            He had less luck in the parking lot of his apartment. But the eerie silence of sirens and authorities was a pleasant reprieve to the thunder of his heart and mind.

            A small voice was telling him to _go back go back go get her_.

            But the larger part – the part that had been steering and dominating Petyr’s life since he nearly embraced death – that part was telling him to _leave her behind you don’t need her_.

            He wouldn’t have to leave if it weren’t for her.

            _Exactly_ , said that voice again. _You don’t need her. Go._

            Petyr bounded the stairs in twos, nearly colliding with an older lady. She threw out a slew of colorful curses Petyr had never heard. Nor did he hear them through the pounding in his head.

            He wished he had known he’d be fleeing _this soon_. Some things were already arranged in his apartment as a precaution – binders of important blackmail and a duffel filled with clothes and the like. Petyr was prepared, but also not. Not mentally.

            He should have been.

            _I told you so_ , said the voice.

            Petyr rounded the last stair and rushed down the hall. He thought he heard sirens finally. Maybe it was in his head. He couldn’t be sure what he heard over his blood and his breath.

            His key was already in his hand when he turned down the hall.

            And stopped.

            His heart was both impossibly loud and incredibly silent.

            The voices stopped.

            The sirens didn’t.

            Nor did the blood pumping and the breath coming out in short bursts.

            She lifted her head towards Petyr.

            Sansa sat, legs bent and arms folded across her knees to pillow her head. As she stood, Petyr could tell she had sat there a long time.

            Probably since this morning.

            He wanted to thank the gods. He wanted to go up and hug her. He wanted so many things.

            Petyr’s mind found itself again. “Go wait by my car, sweetling. Hurry.” Petyr moved around her to set the key in and open the door.

            Sansa was prepared to argue, but he cut her off. “Please. I’ll explain later.”

            Petyr rushed through his apartment, a flurry of grabbing things and knocking things over. Grabbing the duffel of clothes. Binders and boxes and who-knew-what-else were thrown in a spare bag. He moved back to his room and threw in extra shirts. He moved to the bathroom and threw in extra toiletries.

            Petyr’s hand fumbled trying to lock the door on his way out. He cursed at his fingers.

            He ran down the stairs again, bags slamming into his lower back with each leap of stairs. Petyr’s lungs were on fire. His legs ached. On the way down he nearly collided with old-lady-sailor-mouth again, who threw even more colorful curses his way. Had he a mind, Petyr might have remembered them for future use.

            Instead, Petyr’s mind was a single thread, thick and winding and red: _run_.

            He ran across the parking lot. There was definitely the din of sirens in the air, far but growing closer with each painful lunge.

            Sansa was there waiting, thank the gods.

            The doors unlocked. Opened. The bags were thrown in the back atop the folders and his coat. Sansa jumped in. Door slammed. The other. Key in, turned.

            The car roared as Petyr tore out of the parking lot. He clipped another car, not caring about it at the moment.

            The voice: _go go go go GO_.

            In the distance, Petyr heard the sirens. They would be on them, chasing, never stopping. Petyr had left such an obvious trail behind. Petyr had stupidly stopped off at his apartment, wasting minutes he should have used to get the hell out of there.

            He hated how close the sirens sounded. Miles behind, but far too close. Just hearing them meant Petyr was too close, too _caught_.

            Innocent men don’t flee.

            The distance between him and the horrors of his reality were detailed in the volume of the sirens.

            He could be farther along. Away. Free.

            But not with Sansa.

            Petyr glanced towards her. She wasn’t leaning against the door like yesterday – warm and _alive_. Sansa sat with her hands tight against the lap of her seatbelt.

            As though the horrors of her past were chasing her, too.

            But they were, weren’t they?

            A boy lay dead because of her.

            She might not have meant it, or not have meant to push that _particular_ child from stories up.

            But Tommen would never see the blue sky again. Would never laugh.

            That was worth it to save Sansa. Wasn’t it?

            Petyr didn’t know. Didn’t care. Did he?

            The world was always a strange muddle of colors and lines and morals to Petyr. Yet Petyr always managed to wade his way through the confusion and strike out on the most profitable piece of flotsam.

            There wasn’t anything in this sea for miles.

            A touch.

            Petyr noticed how tightly he was holding onto the steering wheel – how much it hurt – when he felt how _soft_ her touch was.

            Sansa’s hand lay gently upon his arm. Not meant to hold or claim or want anything. Just _there_.

            The flurry in Petyr’s head stopped. It was so eerily quiet in his mind, in the car. For a moment, he forgot about the din of sirens chasing them.

            Petyr felt that Sansa was about to say something when a short _ding_ went off. Another.

            She left her one hand on Petyr’s arm and dug through her bag. A phone, old and cracked. But there was a small charm of a wolf with soft white fur and bright eyes.

            He peered at the message. Afraid that someone – Cersei or Joffrey or Slynt or anyone in King’s Landing – was asking where Petyr was. Afraid that Sansa was going to reply and out him. Use him to get away from the Lannisters, and leave him to the beasts.

            She put her phone away. But not before Petyr saw the first two words in big letters: _amber alert_.

            Cersei hadn’t outed Petyr, not yet. But someone saw a strange, leering man lead an innocent child away.

            Which – for some reason unknown to Petyr – made the tension dissipate. It shouldn’t have. It should have brought unending _fear_ and _panic_.

            He wished he could explain the multitude of feelings coiled within his chest. He couldn’t.

            Petyr kept his foot slammed on the accelerator, hands steering from other cars and people and objects.

            Sansa kept her hand on his arm. Fingers wrapped in a light, burning, _claiming_ touch.

            She was as much a devil as he was.

            Two monsters. On the run from their pasts. Running towards an uncertain future.

            Wherever that future was. Whatever fear and turmoil, whatever amount of running and running and running they had in store for them – at least they weren’t alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly this chapter / story evolved into something I was not expecting at all. It was meant to be a cliche teacher/student relationship with smooches and all that, and then.... it isn't. It became really real and dark. It also completely broke away from the teacher/student and into like a hit-and-run story this chapter oops :x  
> I want to say thank you again for everyone with the kind words and encouragment!


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